


Failure to Learn From Mistakes

by Ninj



Category: Jurassic World (2015)
Genre: Future Fic, Gen, Post Incident
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-21
Updated: 2016-01-21
Packaged: 2018-05-15 08:35:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,419
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5778955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ninj/pseuds/Ninj
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Billions of dollars of investments can't just be abandoned. Neither, as it turns out can living breathing assets. In the aftermath of the latest Incident, Owen returns to the park to care for the assets, and maybe find Blue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Failure to Learn From Mistakes

The thing that makes Jurassic World salvageable in the end is twofold. The security systems haven’t failed, and Rexy Sue likes to eat. As a result Owen, Barry, and Lowery are dropped with a team of 15 security workers in order to maintain the health and safety of the assets. It’s been a week since the incident.

InGen’s investment in Jurassic World is huge, and the idea of letting that living investment die of starvation and neglect while lawsuits are settled has not gone over well with the investors in the company, or animal rights activists. With 95% of the animals still in their enclosures, it is clear they will run out of food and starve to death without any chance of adjustment. Initially, there are suggestions to release the ‘assets’ onto Isla Sorna, but they have quickly been rejected. Captive animals are not prepared to survive in the wild amongst animals that have been doing so for over a decade. 

Five members of the security team are originally dedicated to finding bodies, and the rest are to assess and secure the perimeter around the main park. Lowery is to make sure that the park systems continue to run properly in order to contain the rest of the assets. The court paperwork detailed that the assets are to be kept alive until further court paperwork directed them to take action. Owen and Barry are in charge of animal safety and welfare. 

With Rexy Sue waiting in her enclosure to be fed, and the pterosaurs having already been shot down by various Central American military forces, the only assets unaccounted for are Blue and Echo. Owen, believes Echo to be dead, but they haven’t located a body. Lowery requests and receives an additional three control technicians and two maintenance technicians to do physical maintenance within three days, bringing the total number of staff up to 23 people. Claire is required to stay on the mainland as the courts and InGen work through the ongoing liability issues arising out of ‘the incident’. Owen and Claire are making a go of a long distance stress filled relationship. Assisted by most of their co-workers including the staff Claire sends her place, who are very capable. If the park still feels like a graveyard it’s because the displays are silent, the streets are empty, and there is virtually no one there. 

Heavy emphasis is being placed by the investors and courts on income. Without tourists they need to know how Jurassic World is going to make them money and return their investment. Despite the rage of animal activists, it has been more than lightly hinted if the investment can’t continue to be profitable the animals will be destroyed and InGen will salvage as much money and science from that as possible. After all, research on Isla Sorna continues to satisfy the scientific community and that island is somehow, self sustaining. However, Jurassic World has made it clear that dinosaurs and tourists are a concept doomed to failure. 

Owen has thought he was coming back to the island to look for Blue. However, once it has been established she has left the secure perimeter for the restricted zone the fence has been fixed, security systems have been reactivated and it has come down that no one is allowed to leave the secure park area. An InGen helicopter drops half a cow by the raptor pen every other day and reports no sightings of Blue. 

Despite Owen’s fervent wishes to get to the business of tracking Blue, he and Barry are first assigned to maintain and assess the other assets that remained in captivity. Especially the predators. Word has gotten around quickly that Owen had correctly assessed the dangers of the Indominus and the various lawyers and governments involved wanted assurances that the Rex and the Mosasaurus were ‘emotionally suited’ for captivity or like zoo animals enriched to the point that they didn’t think of eating the guests. 

“She’s well contained within the lagoon,” Owen watches the mosasaurus swim around aggressively. Even though she’s getting fed more regularly, she’s used to more food as part of her show. “There’s no way to release her on Isla Sorna, even if we wanted to.” 

“She eats more than Rexy Sue, and her food source needs to be engineered too.” Barry confirms making notations on a tablet for the record keeping. “She’s very expensive.” 

“What are some research benefits?” Owen is grasping at straws. He knows they’re not going to be able to save the Mosa. 

“A group has already come forward wanting to plasticize her,” Barry thinks the Mosa is magnificent, but he wants to save as many of the animals as possible. If it takes letting a few go, he’s willing to be practical. “There are already proposals for two joint post-mortem studies that would advance different scientific fields, and bring money to InGen.”

“Let’s go,” Owen suggests. “Claire’s been on Lowery to keep the animals on a steady feeding schedule.” 

He and Barry turn to the 4 wheelers parked out of the splash zone. They both drive 4 wheelers due to the equipment they have to carry around. Currently, they are the sole caretakers of 100 very expensive assets. Sure, the security teams can dump food, and the admin team monitors conditions, but by the terms set out in the legal agreement Owen and Barry have to visually inspect all of the assets daily. They both agree from experience the easiest way to do this is at feeding. Sometimes they split up. Lowery has been a lifesaver designing as much automation in the feeding process as possible. After what is easily a 10 hour day monitoring animals, they have to go and review by video conference call with InGen lawyers all the different research proposals and funding schemes to for viability. Usually their day runs to 13 hours at least.

Despite being over 20 years old Rexy Sue has not slowed down, nor has she become less aggressive. Owen has attempted in the two weeks to relate to her in some way similar to the raptors and has only established that he is snack sized, and will never be anything more to her than that.

“She’s the top of the island food chain and she knows it,” Owen watches as she chomps her cow from the employee viewpoint. Her vision is poor, and it may have been made worse in the fight with the Indominus. Owen can’t get close enough to tell if she really has a loss of vision, he’s been lobbying for a vet or a vet technician, but so far InGen is reluctant. 

Having confirmed for the day that both the Mosa and Rexy are alive and in their own version of good health, Owen and Barry do split up in order to inspect and care for other animals. The plains herds are the most numerous and yet also the easiest keepers. 

That evening, Owen and Barry are horrified to hear that the idea of a dinosaur zoo is not off the table. 

“What,” is all Owen can say flatly as the InGen lawyer excitedly waves around some concept storyboards. 

“We know where we went wrong,” the lawyer insists. “And even after the incident, the public still can’t get enough. Recent focus group studies done since the incident show that there is still a significant interest in experiencing these animals in person.” 

“I thought the Costa Rican government has been very hesitant about any plans involving bringing people to the island, as have the investors,” Barry reminds the lawyer while trying to sound interested. However, his hand is pale under the table where he’s gripping his chair. 

“No, not that site,” the lawyer shakes his head dismissively. “No one wants to go someplace people died.” 

“Tell that to InGen’s first attorney,” Owen advises. “I think Rexy Sue ate him on the toilet.”

“Please don’t refer to assets by name,” the lawyer huffs. “In order to recoup InGen’s investment we need to acknowledge the facts. Asset 015 an adult female t-rex is not at this time to be included in any of the proposed exhibits.” 

“Exhibits? Plural?” Owen tries to make eye contact with Claire who is sitting down the table from the lawyer on the feed, but she hasn’t spoken or looked up from her tablet the entire time. She’s been very busy on that tablet. 

“Tentatively,” the lawyer hums satisfied. “Obviously, it’s in the early stages, and no commitments have been made. It’s just an idea.”

The lawyer takes a breath, collects himself and sends his assistant into the hall to tell someone they’re ready. He looks somewhat apprehensive as he continues. “Mr. Grady, I’m afraid we must now turn our attention to other commitments made by InGen. Those investors saw a valuable program ruined by early application.”

The door opens wide and several high ranking military officials and their associated administrative staff and consultants, a total of 15 additional people, crowd around the table. Owen is wearing bright blue Bermuda shorts under the table, and flip flops. He resists the highly ingrained instinct to stand and recognize those of higher rank. 

“Allow me to state plainly Mr. Grady, what we would like to see happen here. We’d like an urgent re-evaluation of the raptor program and the remaining assets,” one of the higher ranking military officials explains. “Mr. Hoskins, before his untimely demise thought the program was showing real progress.”

“The assets,” Owen makes sure to shoot the lawyer a steely glare. “Were never going to be viable under combat conditions. You could maybe imprint them on one or two handlers, but once those operators went down you’d never recover the asset. And I’m not free to talk about anything that happened during the latest incident.” 

“We understand,” another figure speaks up. “We recognize that raptors are never going to be used in combat. But we’ve invested a great deal in their training, and our understanding is at least one survives currently.” 

Owen wants to save Blue badly, but he’d be stupid not to remember how this turned out with Hoskins. All it takes is one person to disagree with you and the raptor program you’re nominally running is used to hunt down some scientists ill advised fantasy. 

“At least half of my pack was destroyed,” Owen tells them bluntly. “Raptor’s are social pack animals. A raptor in isolation is dangerous. Dr. Wu is gone so he can’t breed more raptor clutches. Even if he could, or InGen could, there would be difficulties in forming a pack. Any of the exercises I reported to you before are months or years away.” 

“We’d like you to recover a clutch from the breeding nests on Isla Sorna,” the original military leader who is now more in focus and is clearly identifiable as a Colonel speaks again. “You won’t receive clearance for several months. However, we’d like you to go and retrieve a five egg clutch, and resume the program with them.” 

Barry is no longer able to maintain a look of polite interest. Instead he looks deeply shaken and to those that know him, contemptuous. Owen agrees. He can feel his stomach tightening in rebellion. 

“That’s a death sentence,” Barry argues on behalf of his friend. “No one goes into the interior of Isla Sorna and survives.”

“And what about Blue? Babies from another clutch aren’t going to integrate with an adolescent raptor. She’d still be the odd one out,” Owen prays they never get authorization for something so stupid. 

“Plans can be adapted,” a First Lieutenant responds. “If two of your current assets are alive, we propose you be allowed to obtain two raptors of the same age group as they are from Isla Sorna as well. Then you’ll have two raptor groups. Our understanding is that the Isla Sorna raptors are a different variety.”

“They’re less engineered for what you’re interested in.They’re feathered, and very bright,” a new male voice speaks up from the back of the room. “And total killers. To take adolescents out of their pack and expect them not to rip into Grady’s is naive. To even get to a raptor nest to remove eggs is suicidal.” 

“This is Billy Brennan who has survived Isla Sorna, and the raptors,” the Colonel nods in the direction of the back. Due to the crowd Owen and Barry can’t see the voice anyway. Owen recognizes the name. 

Claire finally looks up and meets Owen’s eyes as he tries to ask her silently if he even has a choice. She shakes her head minutely and Owen knows if he wants to keep his job, if he wants to keep Blue, he’ll have to say yes. 

“We’d like an answer in the next 48 hours,” the First Lieutenant tells him and then cuts off the video call without even a goodbye, or a chance for Owen to really dig into what they were proposing. 

“Owen, do not say yes to this,” Barry meets his eyes and he has no doubts. “I know Blue is yours, but the Sorna raptors aren’t engineered. They’ll kill you and Blue.” 

Owen wants to throw something. Several somethings. He has been applying to study the Sorna raptors. Not like his program, just observation. Even that had been deemed too risky. “I need a drink.”

With that he stands and heads back to his hotel room. There he sets two alarms for just before dawn, sends a text message to Lowery saying he’s going to need his help in the morning, and falls into bed. As expected, there’s no sleep. 

***

Dawn finds Owen with his motorcycle standing at the gate to the restricted zone of the island. He’s wearing long pants, heavy boots, and a tactical vest liberated from the security team. He’s got a lot of knives on him too. He’s not dumb enough to expect a warm welcome, but he is ready.

“Alright Lowery open the gate,” he speaks into his earpiece which will be keyed the entire time. 

“This is such a bad idea Owen,” Lowery responds. “Barry is not going to be happy to know why you’re missing rounds this morning. Legally, I’m not supposed to open that gate.” 

“Barry doesn’t expect anything less from me than this,” Owen reminds the both of them.

“Now open the gate.” This he gives as an order, and Lowery knows it’s not optional.

The light turns green with an alarm that starts blaring until he’s through and the gate is secured again. Owen takes a deep tentative breath. No one has seen Blue. The InGen security teams drop cows by chopper, and the carcasses are removed by the time they drop the next cow.

Owen kick starts his motorcycle and proceeds at top speed for the raptor enclosure. Moving fast might attract attention, but the raptors have roughly the same speed. If he’s already moving it’s going to be harder for them to set up an ambush if they are behind him. Besides after the situation with the Indominus they might be hesitant to attack a moving vehicle. Blue on her own will want more advantageous circumstances. If, and Owen is doubtful, Echo is alive they might risk it. 

He reaches the raptor enclosure without being attacked. As expected it’s still wide open from their frantic flight after the Indominus. Owen goes up on the overhead walkways to see if Blue has returned to the enclosure. Although raptors will walk on grates and go up stairs, he happens to know that they dislike it. Even once he’s over the enclosure and still hasn’t spotted anything he keeps his back to a wall. Pulling out some motion detection sensors he throws them down into the pen. His radio earpiece will sound a tone if anything estimated to be larger than 50 pounds goes by one of the sensors. 

“Blue?” Owen calls out trying his best to replicate the tone and authority he’s always used before. “Echo?” 

“You realize you’re basically inviting them to an early morning breakfast of you, right?” Lowery’s voice is still in his ear indicating he’s being monitored. “Claire called me very upset to hear you’d disobeyed a court order. She’s already been told that we can’t come get you under any circumstances.” 

“How long until they drop the cow?” Owen doesn’t respond to Lowery’s warnings. “And can they get it right into the enclosure?”

“You don’t think your girls are smart enough to know better than to go in there?” Lowery seems insulted on behalf of his beta raptors. “Come on Owen, they’ve been free for weeks.”

“They’ve been in the stable,” Owen observes out loud. He can see some fresh palms, and no real way for them to have blown in. It’s open and unlocked since that’s where they charged out of to follow him towards the Indominus. 

“Cow’s delayed. An hour or two,” Lowery tells him. “Barry needed some assistance since you ditched him to go play raptor whisperer.” 

“I’m a sitting duck,” Owen hisses. “At least a cow is interesting to them, and it would have looked like I was bringing them food.”

“Owen, which one of us is the raptor whisperer here?” Lowery sounds incredulous. “They know by now the noisy air thing brings the food. You left them after at least half if not three quarters of their pack were killed taking out a monster for you. You think a cow is going to make up for that?”

“They tried to kill me first,” Owen can’t believe Lowery is taking his raptors side. Then he lets out a low hiss and goes still. He’s looking outside the raptor pen, where it’s easily 150 yards to the tree line and he thinks he saw something out of the corner of his eye. 

“Claire is on the other line,” Lowery tells him. He sounds somewhat hopeful. “You want me to patch her through?I think I could make the phone lines work with the radios. She was kind of speechless earlier, but she might have a few words ready to share with you.”

“No,” Owen answers. “She’s here. At least one. Drop the cow when you can. Otherwise radio silence.” 

Owen moves until he’s closer to the stairway leading up to the walkway. He’s semi sheltered. Now he can see the approach to the enclosure from three sides. There’s no backway in, so he feels marginally safer. Probably a mistake. 

He waits for 20 minutes but sees no more sign of movement. No raptor calls or chirps fill the air. He’s more convinced that Echo is dead and it’s Blue alone. He calls out again, “Blue!”

There’s suspicious movement in the tree line again, but it’s obvious movement. His girl is trying to get him off the high ground. 

“No! Come on Blue, eyes on me,” Owen calls out authoritatively. He barks it like a command. Wishes he’d felt confident enough to bring some training aids with him. 

Blue barks now. It’s not one that’s he’s familiar with hearing from her. But it is Blue, and it is confirmation she’s alive. 

“I have audio confirmation of one raptor,” Owen speaks up for Lowery and the sake of records. “It’s Blue or asset 0450.” 

Blue doesn’t come out from the tree line, and she doesn’t call out again. Owen has to decide. He still wants the cow dropped in the pen. The idea before was to wait until Blue came into the enclosure to eat and then close the door again. However, it appears Lowery was right and his alpha cred is shot to shit. 

“Cow is being loaded,” Lowery informs him. “ETA 15 minutes. Claire wants me to tell you that you take too many risks.”

“Well, it’s not too many risks until you don’t walk away,” Owen offers offhandedly. 

He has a new plan. He has to give the cow to Blue. He’s going to give her the food, and she’s going to take it from her alpha. Ideally he would close the enclosure and do it that way, but being on the free side might confuse her ideas of who was in control. Also, bars don’t make you an alpha. 

Owen carefully approaches the lower level where the controls are. Lowery hasn’t been able to activate them remotely, but he was semi sure that was because of weather, or the main breaker having tripped. As Owen approaches he realizes it’s because the raptors have torn the shit out of the controls. 

“Be advised the controls for the enclosure are disabled. Does the gate work manually?” Owen asks. He very hesitantly takes a picture and texts it back to command. “Add this to the costs of maintaining the raptor program. 

“One person can’t move the gate manually,” it’s a different technician that responds in Owen’s ear. He thinks her name is Amanda. This is really not an ideal situation to try and rebuild a relationship with Blue. He can hear the incoming chopper. Decisions, decisions. 

He waits in the cover of the stable until the chopper is hovering over and releases the cow. The chopper makes hearing anything impossible. If he had been able to hear, he would have heard his motion sensors ping. But he didn’t, which is why five minutes later, everything went to hell.

***

Owen wakes up an indeterminate amount of time later. It’s safe to say, he never saw what hit him. He’s on the ground, and he hurts. He hurts a lot. Beyond that he’s still trying to get his bearings. Given how much it hurts to breath, he might have a cracked rib or two. He hopes fleetingly that they hadn’t dropped the cow on him somehow. 

He floats in a half consciousness for another period of time, focuses on breathing, on trying to figure out what’s wrong with the sky above him. Something is wrong. He’s pretty sure. However, his uncertain haze of pain and confusion is brought to an icy halt by the sound of two raptors chirping at each other. Oh, he thinks as he goes still, that’s what hit him.

Owen has to remind himself to breath because as soon as he stopped his girls went silent again. They’ve dragged him from the enclosure. That’s what’s wrong with the sky. No overhead walkways. Too much greenery. He cautiously twists his head towards where he heard the raptor chirping. Sure enough, there they are. Blue _and_ Echo. 

They are watching him. And he really wishes he did understand what’s going on in their heads. Obviously, Echo had been in the enclosure and could have killed him at any time. But instead they moved him. To kill him later? He really doesn’t know. They’re just watching him. Silently. It’s eerie how still they are. 

Owen very carefully starts to try and move himself into a sitting position. Slowly, eyeing the girls the whole time. He’s on his back on the ground, and none of this feels good to him. It hurts to sit up, but he’s pleased to find out that he’s not torn open anywhere. He suspects he has the vest to thank. There’s definitely some kevlar lining showing. He ends up sitting with his legs kind of crossed. He’s having a hard time breathing. He coughs and the Blue snaps at him. He feels the air rush over his hand as she misses by inches. He holds his hands out to the side and doesn’t observe any blood. So at least he’s not coughing up blood. 

“Hey Blue,” Owen says softly as he continues to assess his arms and legs. “Hey, pretty raptor girl. Glad to see your sister kept you company after all.” 

His back aches. Right towards the top of his vest. He can’t twist and reach back there, but given how filthy the front of his pants are, he’s beginning to think one of them dragged him like a naughty puppy. He’s impressed whichever one it was. He’s no lightweight. 

Blue barks at him again. It’s that angry refusal bark she made from the tree line. Owen reaches up to see if his ear piece is still in. It’s not, but it’s caught up in his collar and doesn’t look too badly damaged. He inserts it back into his ear all while Blue and Echo both start moving sideways around him in different directions. Not good. 

“Girls,” Owen says. “Girls I can see you.”

It’s hard to see them both though. Even if he was on his feet he wouldn’t be able to see them both. His earpiece shrieks with static. He yanks it out with a hiss and jumps to his feet. Echo slams into him again sending him sprawling with an angry scream. Owen loses his breath and lets out a pained grunt. Blue inserts herself between Echo and Owen. 

Owen tries to convince himself that at least Lowery knows he’s alive. It’s probably true too. He can still feel the band around his chest that monitors his vitals. GPS tracking may or may not be working with the earpiece. Probably no one thinks he’s been eaten. This time he levers himself up to his knees. There’s some blood on the ground which confirms he’s bleeding somewhere. 

This time he doesn’t talk or do anything about the girls circling him. They’re chirping at each other, low relaxed trills. Owen had heard this vocalization pattern before sometimes. It’s a game, and games with raptors don’t mean safety. Owen thinks they’re not that far from the raptor area. If he had to guess maybe less than half a mile west. Away from the direction they’d hunted the Indominus. He stands and slowly starts brushing himself off. His knives are mostly missing. 

The girls have stopped circling and Blue barks out her typical greeting upon seeing Owen. Echo trills sharply, and Blue snaps at her in irritation. The higher trills are trouble. 

“Echo girl,” Owen dares eye contact. She trills high again shifting her weight from foot to foot. Obviously, she has mixed feelings about Owen’s return. Blue steps forward until she’s in Owen’s personal space. Owen lets out the reassuring sounds he’s used to sooth them since they were little raptors. “How’s my favorite Blue?”

Blue responds with the same low trill when she’s reporting everything is fine. Which is interesting. She seems to feel secure. She’s keeping herself between Echo and Owen, and Echo’s not challenging her. Just acting uneasy. Blue butts Owen in the chest firmly with her head and then dances back. She trills lowly again as if she’s waiting for Owen to do something. 

“Good girl, Blue, good girl,” Owen tells her meeting her eyes. “You did just fine. You and Rexy Sue did such a good job protecting us.”

Echo lets out a predator bark and she and Blue break for the trees suddenly. Owen is left in the open, exposed with no idea what just spooked his girls. He doesn’t hear any helicopters. However, what he does hear, alarmingly is the roar of an angry t-rex. What the hell?

Owen bolts in the direction he thinks is the enclosure where his motorcycle is. He inserts his earpiece again and starts yelling. “What the hell is going on?”

He continues to get nothing but feedback through the device and he snarls. Running does not feel great right now. But how is there a loose t-rex on the island? It sure doesn’t sound like Rexy. Sure enough, another angry roar is heard a few minutes later. Owen really hopes he’s going in the right direction because he can’t keep up this pace much longer. However, right as he breaks through the treeline into the open ground he realizes something.

The ground is not shaking. The sound is intense, and varying, but the speaks at the raptor enclosure could play that sound. Are playing that sound it turns out as he jump starts his cycle. Bless Claire’s staff. He heads for the fence which is miles away, but it appears that Blue and Echo really did disappear. 

Barry is waiting for him at the gate and swings it open so that he doesn’t have to stop, although Owen does slow down. He also checks to make sure that it’s secure before stopping to tell Barry the good news. 

“Blue and Echo are alive!” Owen shares. Perhaps the re-introduction hadn’t gone as well as planned, but as far as he’s concerned it’s fantastic news. 

“Owen, the security guys said that one of them ‘the smaller blue one’ came right for you,” Barry starts tugging at Owens vest. “I can’t believe we don’t have a medic. You should see your back.”

“I think they dragged me,” Owen confirms. He settles on the 4 wheeler as directed. “Have the stopped playing the rex sound effects? I don’t want to spook them away from the enclosure forever.” 

“Owen, those animals are going to be the death of you,” Barry shakes his head as they arrive at headquarters. “Claire is on her way. She told the lawyers they could go to hell.” 

“How long was I gone for?” Owen asks startled. It’s still light out, so not even a full day. The quality of light is still pretty good.

“The sun will start setting in an hour,” Barry tells him as the reach the command center. “Go up to control. Amanda has first aid training, and they can evaluate you for medical care.”

“I can’t leave if I want to repair the relationship with them,” Owen explains. “I can’t even believe Echo survived. For having been thrown so far, there doesn’t appear to be any loss of mobility. She moves fast!”

“Trust me, there’s video footage,” Barry shoves him gently in the direction of the door. 

***

“Lowery, was that your quick thinking that got me out of there?” Owen asks. If he stopped to think about reality knowing two of his girls are alive doesn’t solve anything. But for weeks he’s been here getting nothing done, and yesterday they’d talked about his program like his bond with the animals was nothing. 

“Amanda’s actually,” Lowery responds. “Now strip so she can look at your back. Claire is going to get here in an hour, and you’re going to look less like something the raptor dragged in.”

“That wasn’t Rexy,” Owen comments to Amanda even as he reluctantly starts trying to un-velcro his vest. It makes things hurt more. 

“Nope, it was the breeding pair on Isla Sorna,” Amanda confirms. “Some researchers posted on a university site about their latest baby. This is their second, and they show strong defensive tendances as related by the Los Angeles incident. Lowery thinks your girls check on Rexy from outside the perimeter. They would know she wasn’t close to them.” 

“Video from immediately after the incident confirms that Blue stayed around Rexy for almost a day,” Lowery explains as Owen takes off his shirt very slowly. “Barry thinks it was to give Echo time to escape and all that jazz. Rexy finally tried to eat her on the second day. Their budding friendship couldn’t overcome Rexy’s memories of the first raptors.”

Amanda presses gently along Owens ribs causing him to hiss in discomfort. “That really hurts you know.”

“I imagine having cracked ribs does,” Amanda responds letting go of his ribs to pick up tweezers. “You’re going to need to go off island to get this taken care of.” 

“What’s the shortest time possible for that?” Owen asks. “If the military is serious about wanting to continue the raptor study, I can’t keep leaving them. Pretty sure I’m not the alpha anymore.”

“Claire will explain,” is all anyone will say in response to that. The next hour is full of stings as Amanda confirms that he was bitten and dragged by mouth. One shallow claw wound on his lower back also needs butterfly bandages and will probably scar without stitches. 

When Claire gets there she’s in one of her white suits and heels. She strides into the control room like she’s never been missing and takes up her traditional spot in front of the touch screens. She makes brief eye contact with Owen before asking for a full report. Owen waits as her staff provide her with information on asset containment systems-all operational, guest accommodations-all closed, and animal health reports-all late. And to bring the report to a conclusion she’s informed that there are two assets outside their enclosure in the restricted zone, and they have injured a park employee today.

“You know, the military was all for giving you an asset number and leaving your ass in the restricted zone just to see what your overgrown raptor playmates would do to you,” Claire speaks with the disapproval that had been so common before the incident. However, Owen thinks he sees some gaps in the performance.

“Well they dragged me away from raptor jail, where an unknown flying thing keeps dropping food on them, and then Blue tried to say hello and ask for something to do,” Owen tells her. He’s grinning stupidly. He knows he’s grinning stupidly. It beats laughing which would hurt his ribs.

“She recognized you as alpha?” Claire sounds intrigued, and happy for him.

“No,” Owen answers firmly. She hadn’t. Nothing about her or Echo had been deferential. “She did however, recognize me as pack.”

“Well good,” Claire responds. “Because the park re-opens next year, and there’s supposed to be a IMAX live raptor training session.”

“What,” Owen repeats flatly. “Claire, yesterday the military told me they wanted to steal a clutch from Isla Sorna and the lawyer seemed to imply there were some other plans.”

“That lawyer was fired,” Claire waves her hand dismissively takes his arm and guides him from the room full of cameras and nosy co-workers. They end up walking around the plaza.“InGen was re-acquired by the Hammond family. Lex and Tim and their crack team of lawyers are laying some initial groundwork.”

“Lex and Tim, from the original park? Whose screams of terror are probably a fond memory for Rexy after a day of annoying tourists? They want to reopen the park?” 

Claire make a face Owen can’t quite understand, but it beats her poker face. “Not particularly. But the other options for the assets weren’t going to work out. The military is barred from further work or genetic experimentation with animals that were extinct. By Executive Order.” 

“So what? The Hammond family takes a third crack at a theme park?”

“Final crack,” Claire responds. “They came very prepared with plans for how to wind down the park. Animal breeding stops now. The park only runs until the assets die out. The preliminary estimates are at 20-30 years. Consultants from the zoo’s and Sea World indicate captive animals almost never live as long as animals in the wild. It’ll be a non-profit from now on. Operating costs only.”

“And the courts and the public are going to go for this?” It seems so easy and simple. Like hitting a re-set button. 

“Lex was on the board of directors of InGen, and had system read access from Simon. While we were screaming and running for our lives, she was plotting,” Claire sounds deeply admirable. “She’s been in contact with almost all survives of the other incidents. They’ve signed on to do their part.”

“Are any of them coming here?” Owen asks hopefully. They never have. Owen’s tried to go to Dr. Grant’s lectures, but he’s never been able to get away from the park. 

“Owen, you’re the only person I know who nearly gets killed and instead of wanting to avoid the animals, comes back to try and repair your bond,” Claire seems amused. “No, Dr. Grant declined the invitation to come and see the raptor squad. For the 15th time.”

“Is it still a raptor squad if there are only three of us?” Owen starts guiding Claire towards the gate he’d recently returned through. 

“We are not going back out there. You are going off this island to get medical attention and convince Lex and Tim you’re stable enough to keep your raptor gang,” Claire objects once she realizes they’re near the perimeter fence. 

“I am stable enough,” Owen assures her. “I’m not taking you out of here.I just want to see if they followed me. Do you think InGen would give me one of the resonating chambers that Dr. Grant used on Isla Sorna?”

“What, so you can communicate with them in code?” Claire hisses. “Honestly. Be thankful you’re not being sent to Sorna to die trying to get yourself a new clutch.”

“I didn’t want a new clutch,” which was the perfect truth. Blue and Echo were his girls. Two raptors and a human wasn’t an ideal situation, but he’d make the best of it. “If we’re not making any more assets maybe they don’t need a pen.”

“You are not leaving those two out there to figure out how to break in,” Claire warns. “We’ll find a nice Grady approved way to make the technicians safe, and maybe, if you’re good, you can have raptor team field trips.”

“Did you hear that Blue,” Owen calls towards the bluest patch of greenery that’s not moving. He huffs out the familiar raptor coo that he usually makes when just saying hi to his girls. It doesn’t sound anything like them, but he gets hello barks back from both of them as they emerge just a bit from the foliage. “Better hunting. No more pigs in a pen.”

Owen gives them the hand signal to release from attention. Blue barks a surprising hello at Claire, not a pack hello. Not the way she greets Owen, or greeted her alpha, but a non-threat acknowledgement. They disappear. Owen and Claire turn back towards the plaza and continue walking.

“Do you think this is a good idea?” Claire asks as they stand watching the Mosa swim some time later. The last rays of light a slowly fading out. “Bringing people back here?”

“Not a good idea,” Owen says slowly. “But maybe it’s the best we can do as a result of our own foolishness.” 

“Keep making better mistakes?” Claire asks leaning against him. 

“Take advantage of these mistakes to enjoy them while they’re here again,” Owen replies. The Mosa dives deeper into the shadows, and in the distance Rexy roars her triumph over her dinner. “All things pass, maybe this time we’ll let them pass gracefully.”


End file.
